Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Is Tennis Over Yet?, My Birthday, and Eleanor Roosevelt.

We are now in the fourth week of school. Tennis will be done for JV/C tomorrow, after we get annihilated by Centennial. Team sections for varsity are Oct 6, with individuals following that. This is the first time I've had to stay on and help the varsity, as a JV/C coach. I'm about done with tennis. I threw my back out a week ago and my left foot and ankle are still numb, which has never happened before. This makes tennis, standing or coaching, uncomfortable. I'm also starting to get a little sick, most likely bc I have yet to fall into a daily pattern that involves a few Nalgenes of water. Simply put, I need a break. Today was the first rain cancellation that we've had all season and I'm very thankful for it. I have a chiropractor appointment at 3 and then I'm headed home for the first school day all year. I'm planning on snuggling up on the couch with some TiVo.

The four weeks have gone by super fast though. Every weekend has been jam-packed and this weekend will be no different, aside from one slight detail...someone is turning 32! I'm keeping it low-key this year and have just planned a trip to the magic table on the West Side, some cuppycakes, appetizers, a fire, and some beers. For my actual birthday, I'll be working at Lifetime and then maybe I'll watch some football and have a nommy birthday dinner. Not sure, but that sounds like a good plan to me. My birthday present to myself is to try out acupuncture on Saturday morning - fun!

In the past two months I've been reading a lot of Eleanor Roosevelt. I read My Year With Eleanor and while I didn't care for the author, I've very much enjoyed getting to know ER. I read Learn by Living and liked it so much that I bought it for Josh and highlighted all of my favorite passages. I also requested a copy for myself for my birthday. I'm currently reading her autobiography, but it's quite lengthy and I'm on renewal #3 at the library. I may end up buying that one as well...

Here are a few of my favorite quotes from Learn by Living:

I find that life is much more satisfactory when it forms a kind of pattern, though I do not believe in too rigid a pattern. In the first place, you will create a pretty uninteresting and sterile atmosphere if everything is set so rigidly that it cannot be changed. Inflexibility will make your life an unnecessary burden and it will also make it dull. Worst of all, it will make you a burden to other people.  (pg. 51)

I think one of the basic things to recognize is that the only valuable development is the development of an individual. If you try to change that individual so that he loses his personality, you have done something that has destroyed the most important thing about a human being, his essential difference from anybody else. Any one of us who tries to make someone over and force him into an image of what we think he should be, rather than encourage him to develop along his own lines, is doing a dangerous thing.  (pg. 69)

Not to arrive at a clear understanding of one's own values is a tragic waste. You have missed the whole point of what life is for. (pg. 73)

Unhappiness is an inward, not an outward, thing. It is as independent of circumstances as is happiness. Consider the truly happy people you know. I think it is unlikely that you will find that circumstances have made them happy. They have made themselves happy in spite of circumstances.  (pg. 82)

Human relationships, like life itself, can never remain static. They grow or they diminish. But, in either case, they change. Our emotional interests, our intellectual pursuits, our personal preoccupations, all change. So do those of our friends. So the relationship that binds us together must change too; it must be flexible enough to meet the alterations of person and circumstance. (pg. 86)

To respect one's fellow men is perhaps more difficult that to "love" them in a wide, vague sense. In fact, it is possible that to feel respect for mankind is better than to feel love for it. Love can often be misguided and do as much harm as good, but respect can do only good. It assumes that the other person's stature is as large as one's own, his rights as reasonable, his needs as important. (pg. 102)

Your ambition should be to get as much life out of living as you possibly can, as much enjoyment, as much interest, as much experience, as much understanding. Not simply to be what is generally called "a success." (pg. 118)

This is your life, not someone else's. It is your own feeling of what is important, not what people will say. Sooner or later, you are bound to discover that you cannot please all of the people around you all of the time. Some of them will attribute to you motives you never dreamed of. Some of them will misinterpret your words and actions, making them completely alien to you. So you had better learn fairly early that you must not expect to have everyone understand what you say and what you do. 
The important thing is to be sure that those who love you, whether family or friends, understand as nearly as you can make them understand. If they believe in you, they will trust your motives. But do not ask or expect to have anyone with you on everything. Do not try for it. To reach such a state of unanimity would mean that you would risk losing your own individuality to attain it. 
I never can understand why so many people are afraid to live their own lives as they themselves think is right. You can get rid of your neighbors but you cannot get rid of yourself, so you are the person to be satisfied. (pgs. 124-125)

Why should we shy away with shame from having made a mistake? No human being is all-wise; no human being always lives up to the best that he is capable of. Failure comes to everyone, except when one does nothing at all, which in itself is a failure. All we can do is to be honest with ourselves, be humble and try, as we gain wisdom, to rectify our mistakes and possibly to avoid some of them. (pg. 154)

For one thing we know beyond all doubt: Nothing has ever been achieved by the person who says, "It can't be done." (pg. 168)

I think she's a pretty neat lady and I'm excited to read and learn more about her.

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